Can Winston Peters make another come-back?

Yes he can. And so what if he does?

In the 2008 election, Winston Peters’ NZ First Party was knocked out of parliament as they won only 4.07% of the party vote, below the 5% threshold. This was partly because National Party leader John Key said, before the election, that he would not work with Winston Peters. For those who wanted a change to a National-led government, a vote for NZ First was thereby rendered worthless.

But in the next election, Peters asked voters to see his party as an opposition, and NZ First was back with 6.59% party vote. For most of the intervening three years (2008–11), almost all opinions polls had NZ First under 5%, sometimes as low as 1%. It wasn’t until shortly before the November 2011 election that a few (but not all) polls started to show NZ First over 5%. The polls may have been underestimating NZ First support, and/or there may have been a late surge.

We can’t rely on the past to predict the future. But, given past performance, neither can we safely bet that NZ First has no chance of a come-back in this year’s election.

NZ First got only 2.6% in 2020, but if they squeeze in over 5% this year, then (going on recent polls) what could happen? One possible outcome gives Labour/Green/Māori insufficient seats to form a government without NZ First’s support; but also the National/ACT can’t form a government even with NZ First. Peters has rejected Labour this time round, but he could end up helping Labour form the next government anyway, for the sake of stability.

It’s hard to see NZ First getting on well in a coalition that includes either the Māori Party or the ACT Party. But the desire to hold office always makes compromising look more attractive. Just recall the arrangements that John Key made with the ACT, United Future and Māori parties to form three successive government.

There’s also a prospect of a hung parliament where no leader will have established a clear majority by the time the House assembles (which is less of a problem than it may sound).

Some readers may feel annoyed about any prospect of Peters coming back. But let’s not discount the possibility that two quite diverse minor parties (NZ First and the Māori Party) may have roles to play in government formation. The election results, and hence the post-electoral bargaining power and options that each party will possess, are unpredictable at this stage.

In his speech on 24 March, Peters addressed numerous critical policy issues: poor economic performance, inflation, superannuation age (which “will not change”), literacy and numeracy levels (harmed by “virtue-signalling tinkerers”), truancy, human capital and economic performance, labour market and job-seeker benefit, healthcare waiting lists, Pharmac’s performance, safety and security, crime stats, energy efficiency and sustainability.

Peters complained that, despite a labour shortage in the health sector, many doctors and nurses had been “mandated out of a job”, and so vaccine mandates will end under NZ First. All government departments’ names will be changed back into English names. Gang membership will be an automatic aggravating factor in court; assaulting a police officer or other first responder in the course of their duty will lead to a mandatory 6-month minimum prison sentence.

Peters alleged that there’s “a full-scale attack being waged on New Zealanders’ culture, identity and sense of belonging.” He blamed academic social scientists among others. He always talks like that before an election; but doesn’t rock the boat afterwards.

One intriguing insight came out of Winston’s interview on Newshub Nation (10’50” in). He appeared to claim that the reason for the failure of coalition talks between National and NZ First in 2017 was that, at their first meeting, Bill English had taken Peters aside to say that Judith Collins didn’t have the numbers to roll him. The threat of a coup, Peters said, was the reason why NZ First had to make the decision that they made: that is, to put Ardern into office instead of English. If only the interviewer had allowed him to finish this story. Even if inaccurate, it was a story about how our history was made, straight from the lips of someone who helped make it. And I’m wondering now what Bill English would say about that meeting.

As for the future, I won’t be placing bets on whether NZ First goes above or below the 5% threshold in October.